If you had a no-kids wedding...
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Anonymous
| What do people think about family and out of town kids only weddings? We are hoping for a relatively small wedding, first for me, second for my fiance. We are a bit older, and almost every guest we would invite has kids. We are talking 30+ kids. If we include everyone's kids, it would completely change the type of wedding we could afford. OTOH, it would fun to have kids there. It will mean the difference between a somewhat elegant, but small dinner reception and basically a tent barbecue. |
Anonymous
| No regrets! As a parent, I'm absolutely fine with no-kid weddings. Especially for night events like ours. I would never want to bring our toddlers to a 6 pm wedding anyway! |
Anonymous
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No kids and no regrets whatsoever. We paid for a babysitter for the entire time of the ceremony and reception at a nearby hotel. I think maybe 5 kids hung out there.
When my sister was married last year my two kids were not allowed. I loved not having to spend time with them and really getting the chance to celebrate my sister's special day and catch up with friends and family. My kids were at the brunch the next day and all the visiting family had the chance to see them then. |
Anonymous
| No regrets. |
Anonymous
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No kids wedding and now that I have kids of my own...yes. I'm a little embarrassed at how adamantly I insisted on No Kids at My Wedding.
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Anonymous
| We had our nieces and nephews in the wedding party, but no kids other than that. We just couldn't afford the 30 or so extra guests, even though I LOVE kids. It probably did mean a couple or two didn't come who might have otherwise, but I don't really regret it. |
Anonymous
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We had no kids (exceptions for infants) and yes I regret it, but then again, I regretted it at the time. It was truly the only way we could afford to have just about every family member there. My mom is from a family of 12 (yes, her parents were Catholic!) but she got divorced, and remarried, into another large family and DS has four brothers, all married. Between us we have well over 100 first cousins. There would have been nearly 100 children to accommodate, had we allowed children, so we didn't. We also did not invite second cousins, (even though I'm tighter with some of them than I am with some first cousins) great aunts / great uncles, or many friends, really. Just basically our closest friends and family. We were still at over 300 and, although we did it as cheaply as possible, but we ran out of money and this was the only way we could cut things up without alienating my family.
So I don't regret being some sort of fussy bridezilla in any way, because I wasn't. I actually wanted to have kids. I would have rathered invited the people I love, and their kids, and worried less about inviting one cousin but not the other, etc, etc. But everyone told me I couldn't do it that way, or there would be irreparable family damage. So I guess I regret that I went for etiquette over emotion. I would have rather had someone's kids there than my drunk ass racist uncle, that's for sure. |
Anonymous
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OP here. Wow, a lot of bridezillas on the run today, huh?
I had 3 weddings and all 3 were kid friendly. The one in the US was on a Suday morning, a private civil ceremony with a flower girl (I was not planning on it but she asked to be my flower girl when her mom mentioned I was getting married) and 15 kids for the brunch - all kids I Au Paired for and a hand full of our friend's kids. Our wedding in Asia had over 750 guests so we estimate we had at least 100 kids. It was amazing! So much fun! The dance floor was packed for 4 hours!!!! Again, the ceremony was private so only 4 kids (our nephews) were present and when the baby started fussing mom took her outside. Our last wedding was in South America. Children are expected and welcome. The church's nursery is at the parents disposition during the ceremony so they can watch it from there. There's no need to get angry, folks... I had a friend coming to apologize for saying no kids on her wedding now that she has a child of her own. I told her that there's nothing to apologize and I was kinda happy to be able to find an "excuse" to leave DCs behind for some adult time. I was just curious but seems like some of you, even after several years, are still very emotional about it. *tee hee* |
Anonymous
| Nope. No regrets at all. We had an evening wedding with a formal sit down dinner. No dancing, just good food and conversation. It was a lovely event and I am so glad that we did not invite children. And I have no problem with adults only weddings now. |
Anonymous
No. Either it's a kids-welcome wedding (they're lovely) or an adults-only wedding (they're lovely, too). But you don't get to vary the invitation on a case-by-case basis. Would have have a wedding in which spouses can come if the guests are traveling, but otherwise it's just the half of the couple you're closest to? We told guests what the wedding was going to be like and asked if their kids would like to come or if they would like us to help them make other arrangements or if we should just leave them to make their own arrangements. No kids came, and that was fine. My sister invited only the child whose parents never went anywhere without him. At the time, I thought "That is exactly the sort of kid I wouldn't want at my wedding." He didn't come anyway. |
Anonymous
No bridezillas, sweetie, but when you use inflammatory words, like "let go of your ego, and the insanely stupid little tee hee at the end it really makes you seem immature and yes, like you may be fishing for a fight. And I'm glad you had the $ money to pay for 3 weddings for over 1000 people total, but many of us don't. 
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Anonymous
| Kids were at my wedding, it'd have been weird without them. |
Anonymous
Now that I have kids, I'm doubly glad we excluded children from our evening wedding. Our children are 8 and 10, for point of reference. Children spoil the video recordings, make a mess and distract their parents. I gave no on extra PITA or expense, because we hired two babysitters to watch all the children in a room next to the reception room. Only one friend declined due to not wanting to hire a babysitter, and I respect her choice. She's not really the "dance and party" type, so it was no big loss, although I felt she could have left her baby with her DH and come to the 22 minute ceremony and skipped the reception. Whatevs. |
Anonymous
| No regrets at all about my no-kids JOP wedding at the courthouse. I love these wedding threads and all the angst over every little detail to make the "perfect" day. I have yet to read anything anywhere (not just on DCUM) that makes me regret not having a "real" wedding. |
Anonymous
Just to give you some perspective, the most expensive of the 3 was the US wedding for 40 ppl. And it's not about having the money, it's about willingness to make it happen. We could easily afford something grand for fewer people but we preferred to give up on a few details to make sure we could invite more loved ones. We prefer friendship to status.
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